Today, I do not have joy in being Catholic. Today I am heartbroken.
The Emerald Isle, the beautiful little Catholic country who has been the leader in being so faithful to God for fifteen centuries has slapped God in the face.
A generation of young Irish people went to the polls last Friday and voted to redefine marriage. The youth decided in their knowledge and wisdom they knew better than God. Sodomy is now protected in their constitution. Because, of course, the Irish youth know best.
The tragedy is that while young people in the Middle East are being burned, beheaded and tortured for their faith, Ireland is celebrating its divorce from its faith.
Who is to blame?
Well, if we look at the context, the biggest reason why Ireland fell to the devil's deception is that the bishops and priests failed to live and teach Christianity. They were cowardly or even ruthlessly unfaithful. Ireland's bishops will have to one day stand before all the Irish martyrs and even worse, God Himself and give an account of why they had so little courage to fight for the right.
Secondly, it was some of the USA billionaires who flooded Ireland with money to the tune of $25 million dollars to bribe the people to vote yes and the bishops and priests to remain silent. Yes, American culture has so little tolerance of other cultures that we have to remake other countries in our image. The secular humanist image of America.
Finally, the parents. Irish Catholics were lukewarm so their children rebelled.
The Catholic world needs to see what just happened in Ireland and wake up. This is every bit as momentous a situation as the priest sexual scandal. In fact, this march away from Catholicism is due to the sexual scandal. People no longer believe priests who abuse and bishops who allow it.
Time for Catholic bishops and priests to awake and smell the martyrdom coming. Brace yourselves, for this generation of priests will be paying the price for yesterday's unfaithful cowards.
Irish Catholics, turn and look at your brothers and sisters in Christ in the middle east and be ashamed. My heart is broken, for your failures are my failures. We are one Body. We are Christ's Body.
Catholics around the world, we need to repent. We need to mourn our lukewarmness and our sins against Our Lord. We need to pray for courage to stand and speak the truth.
